Day 1

It started off with me waking up at 10am. Not particularly ideal, but if you read my last post, you know I needed it, lol.

It’s now past “hiker midnight” aka 9pm. I have internet and I woke up when a particularly loud gust of wind came by, lol. This may be a trend, as biphasic sleep schedules were common in the days before electricity. Sleep for a few hours, wake up and do some stuff, go to sleep.

I had to buy fuel from REI before setting out, as the food I packed for this first leg is mostly the fancy stuff that requires cooking (well, pouring boiling water into a bag). Later I’ll have some more combinable stuff, tortillas, peanut butter, sausage and cheese (not all at once… unless I do? Someone do an experiment and get back to me, lol).

I got a ride to the REI that was closest to the park, which was about an hour away, then got a ride from that REI to the park, which was about an hour and a half away, and long story short, I didn’t get to the park until 2/3.

I ate a sandwich and got going. The first tiny little leg from the visitor’s center with the famous arch up to the bottom of the falls was a refreshing walk.

The walk up twenty bajillion stairs to the top of the falls was not that fun, lol.

I then walked for another hour or so, til about 6pm, when I saw an older lady (80+?) struggling with a tent pole. Knowing that the sun goes down earlier in the mountains, and wanting to help (and worn out from going up the stairs of doom), I decided that now was as good a time to stop as any.

I asked her if she needed help, and she did (and hell, I almost did too, it was so difficult, lol), so I helped her get it seated, and set up my tent. By 7ish I had my tent set up, had ate (chicken coconut curry) and was lying down as the sun descended. I decided to start writing, and got as far as “it started with me waking up at 10” before getting tired and going to sleep.

I woke up around 930pm, and fidgeted until I decided to write. Now I go back to sleep(?).

Day 1

Ps. It gets cold quickly in the mountains in March :-p